At the beginning of March, New York City’s Board of Correction released a preliminary report on Rikers Island’s controversial new isolation facility, the Enhanced Supervision Housing Unit (ESHU). The $14.8 million ESHU was proposed to house 250 of Rikers’ so-called “most dangerous” inmates– a small minority of the prison population that officials claim is responsible for the majority of inmate violence.

28% of ESH inmates came directly from punitive segregation and 6% came from long-term isolation units known as Restrictive Housing Units (RHU).

ESH inmates averaged 192 days in punitive segregation in the past year. The Board notes that “with the recent punitive segregation restrictions of no more than 30 consecutive days or 60 days within any six month period, inmates who have maxed out their time in punitive segregation (which includes RHU) may be transferred to ESH.” They promise to closely watch the flow of inmates from punitive segregation to the ESHU.

Though sending US troops into Ukraine was already controversial, a report by the Associated Press shows a bad situation is getting worse. According to the AP the US forces being sent into Ukraine will be training Neo-Nazi militants who have already been accused of war crimes.

The neo-Nazis will be trained by US forces to more effectively kill people in East Ukraine.

The United States plans to send soldiers to Ukraine in April for training exercises with units of the country’s national guard. Ukraine’s Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said in a Facebook post on Sunday that the units to be trained include the Azov Battalion, a volunteer force that has attracted criticism for its far-right sentiments including brandishing an emblem widely used in Nazi Germany.

Avakov said the training will begin April 20 at a base in western Ukraine near the Polish border and would involve about 290 American paratroopers and some 900 Ukrainian guardsmen.

The US policy in Ukraine has been a nightmare from the beginning. First supporting a violent overthrow of a democratic government and now supporting and training neo-Nazi militants who have committed war crimes. What kind of Ukraine is the US trying to foster?

An agent from the DEA and an agent from the Secret Service have been charged with wire fraud and money laundering for stealing and extorting Bitcoin during the federal investigation of the Silk Road online marketplace. The agents are alleged to have successfully taken money from the founder of Silk Road, Ross Ulbricht, during an investigation into a possible murder-for-hire scheme as well as stealing seized funds.

After obtaining the money the agents laundered it using private accounts. In one case money was laundered to Panama and in another case funds were laundered to Mt. Gox which would later be seized by federal authorities partly due to the orders of the agent involved in the theft. Both agents privately enriched themselves using their power as law enforcement officials according to the indictment.

Ulbricht, who supposedly went by the moniker “Dread Pirate Roberts,” has already been convicted for his involvement in drug trafficking but with these revelations the murder-for-hire case may not make it to court.

The agents now facing charges led a Baltimore-based murder-for-hire case against Ulbricht, separate from the drugs-related charges on which he was found guilty. The murder-for-hire case remains pending. Prosecutors identified the agents as Carl Force, 46 years old, of Baltimore, a special agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration, and Shaun Bridges, 32, of Laurel, Maryland, a special agent with the U.S. Secret Service…

Using the online persona “French Maid,” Force did succeed in getting $100,000 in Bitcoin from Ulbricht, which Force deposited in his personal accounts, the federal complaint says. He later used a series of Bitcoin and personal U.S. dollar transactions, including a $235,000 wire transfer to an account in Panama, to launder the stolen money, prosecutors allege in the complaint…Bridges allegedly stole $820,000, using a series of wire transfers to move Bitcoin that earlier had been stolen from Silk Road in early 2013 and deposited in a Japanese bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox, according to prosecutors. Two days later, Bridges signed the government’s warrant to seize millions of dollars in bitcoin from Mt. Gox accounts.

The evidence of misconduct by federal agents was kept out of Ulbricht’s drug trafficking trial though it seems likely that Ulbricht may use the information to try and reopen that case. The investigation Force and Bridges were apart of did result in an indictment but, not surprisingly, prosecutors have not been anxious to advance the case.

Ulbricht’s lawyer now calls the entire investigation into his clients activities “fatally compromised from the inside.”

In honor of OK Computer being archived by the Library of Congress, I place today a quasi-song off the album. Expect a post about the album later in the week. International Politics Overall – Pew: While 49 percent of Americans support U.S. negotiations with Iran, 63 percent do not believe Iran is serious – Journalist Tim Shurrock asks a [...]

The events of the last week or so brought this subject to mind and stirred my curiosity. The very first time i flew was when my mother decided to move us down to Naples Florida in the South West par of the state. This was in 1964 an on a National Airlines turbo prop Trip [...]

Journalists arrested while covering ongoing protests in Ferguson, Missouri, after Michael Brown was killed by a police officer have sued the St. Louis County police. The lawsuit alleges [PDF] that at least twenty officers, whose identities remain unknown, engaged in “unlawful conduct” that “was undertaken with the intention of obstructing, chilling, deterring, and retaliating against [...]

There is no historical controversy as contentious or long-lasting as the North Korean and Chinese charges of U.S. use of biological weapons during the Korean War. For those who believe the charges to be false — and that includes much of American academia, but not all — they must assume the burden of explaining why [...]

Dozens dead after airstrikes on camp for displaced Yemenis: An airstrike on a displaced persons camp in Yemen … http://t.co/AougTuy62E — Silicon Angel (@SiliconAngel) March 30, 2015 The war in Yemen has escalated with Saudi troops massing on the border preparing to invade the country to put down the Shiite Houthis rebellion that ousted Yemen’s [...]